Warren G. Harding … yesterday, today and tomorrow

Besides being a hot topic of conversation at Bruins games, the administration of Warren G. Harding apparently has significant relevance today. One could make a connection between the oil scandals and l’affaire Teapod Dome of his administration and the chicanery of Bush 43; or at least I assume so, as I have some reading to do. I am just starting Upton Sinclair’s Oil, after having seen the masterful There Will Be Blood last week. Coming later today in the mail … The Teapot Dome Scandal: How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country.

"Warren G. Harding was a worthless piece of s***. F*** him. His presidency was a taint, not just in the sense of a ‘stain on the office,’ but literally a taint – the anatomical area between the anus and the testicles. I hate Warren G. Harding." –Stephen Colbert, America

David Halberstam

David Halberstam’s untimely passing is sad — particularly given that he was only 73, died in a car accident and was still writing. One of the first "adult" sports books I ever read (borrowed from the Northborough Free Library in 1985 or so) was his look at the 1979-1980 Portland TrailBlazers, The Breaks of the Game — introducing me to Bill Walton and the briefly great Billy Ray Bates. On the political front, The Best and Brightest was groundbreaking. Perhaps this will be enough to finally push me to read his rather large tome on the civil rights movement, The Children. It’s been in my to-read pile since 1998 (I believe I’ve moved twice in that time).

!Prospero Ano y Felicidad!

Well, another year come and gone. We are truly entering fogey territory by the fact that we were in bed at 11:45 p.m. last night after a long day and an excellent, nearly child-free dinner with the Inmans and Tipper-Simkinses. See FoodontheFood for a better writeup — including allusions to the shameful Millennium Party of 46A Belmont Street and its blood, sweat and tears — than I could ever write. You really can’t beat a dinner wherein 2/3 of the contributors have graduated culinary  school, and the third is an excellent cook (and I’m married to her).

Notable were two areas of discussion at the party — 1) For people with cognitive disabilities, what is the minimum criteria for being skilled enough at something (such as playing Ray Stevens’ "Everything is Beautiful" on the piano) to be considered a "savant" (I guess the use of the term "idiot" at the start has finally been declared offensive)?  (We never answered that one, really). 2) Is it wrong to dispose of a stale gingerbread house simply by flinging it out your back door into the bushes, given that its (the gingerbread house) biodegradable? (Wrong, debatable; odd, yes).

All the other kids went to sleep except our son! Huzzah! He declared his participation in the sleepover over and came downstairs during the end of dinner, and we departed by 11. Amazingly, there is no traffic at 11 on New Year’s Eve.

Speaking of Jacob, yesterday we told him that he is going to be a big brother come May. He, of course, has no concept of time and we had hoped to hold off some, but given the conflicting advice we’ve gotten decided to roll the dice. He enjoys going up to Juliet’s burgeoning belly and "talking" to the baby, and already plans to teach the baby about "Tom Brady and Antowain Smith" (his words … unfortunately, all of his Patriots references are from the 2001 season given that he watches the DVD a *lot* … we haven’t had the heart to tell him Adam Vinatieri is a Colt).

Other odds and sods:

• We threw out the Christmas tree today. The most fun part is chucking it over the balcony from our living room in order to drag it out to the curb (thus avoiding the need to vacuum the stairs, foyer, etc.) … just so I don’t inadvertently clobber Terri or Ezra with it, I did yell "Heads up!" before doing so. Not that one would expect a tree to fall from the sky with just the simple warning of "heads up."
• I got to watch 10 minutes of the Rose Bowl and around 10 minutes of something called the "Capital One Bowl" today. I love that they’ve now completely dispensed with the nouns within bowl names and have gone right to sponsors only. Right now, as I am also finishing up a press release for a pitch this week, I’m keeping my eye on the Fiesta Bowl — go Boise State and your quirky blue home-field turf.
• Just started Dave Eggers’ new novel What is the What.
• My annual bout of post-holiday depression should be starting … now. Go!

A Look at Books …

Well, just got back from a great afternoon at my parents’ house with my cousins and aunt from my Dad’s side (as well as my first cousin, once removed, Schuylar (age 2+) and my newest first cousin, once removed, Payton (age six months)). Good to see folks who travelled from Louisville via Albany to spend the day with us, and my parents did a great job hosting this, the second of three distinct groups that will spend time on Evergreen Street this week.

As I am now procrastinating on a PR plan I need to review (I really need the structure of an office and normal workday), a quick note on some holiday books I received as gifts. First off, two political tomes — Jimmy Carter’s Palestine: Peace not Apartheid (controversial amongst all my Zionist friends) and Barrack Obama’s follow-up to his excellent autobiography, this one entitled The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, books from my friends and colleagues Brian and Keri, respectively.

I also blew a few Borders gift cards I had received from Juliet on a number of sports books — Jackie Robinson’s I Never Had it Made, an Autobiography; the new Maravich biography; and John Wooden’s My Personal Best. I’m interested in learning more about Coach Wooden — the Wizard of Westwood had a positively Auerbachian run in the NCAA tournament in the 1960s and is hailed as an excellent coach, leader and mentor — yet he seems like such an anachronism when you see him during each year’s NC2A Tournament (particularly when UCLA went to the FInals last year). Plus, I like books about sports.

Of course, I can’t start reading any of these until I finish The Wisdom of Crowds — which is slow going, not due to content but more to the fact that I’m sleepy by the time I sit down to read it.